WC4 Mod For Homeworld 2 In The Works (June 5, 2006)

@gavinfoxx - Thanks for the list! Some of these are already in the UBW hopper. @Lunawolf242 has been drafting up some interesting concepts for the Waterloo and we have the Gettysburg in queue, We're also looking at adding in a Bengal as a heavy carrier for the UBW along with a Concordia fleet carrier and a Wake CVE. The next major release (or series of incremental releases based on how fast we can churn some of this out) will have updated UBW capships since the fighters just got a makeover.

We're tinkering with a Morningstar as well. A lot of what you have listed is actually slated for a future release wrapped around a potential Merc/Pirate faction. I'll let Lunawolf and L.I.F speak more the specifics on mechanics and timing since they do all the real work :). So stay tuned! Lots of cool stuff on the horizon.
 
Sweet baby Sivar!

Pretty soon you guys will need to do "Era" releases with all the units you are adding!

(That's my subtle nudge for an "Earth Defense Campaign" setup)
 
Dundradal said:
Sweet baby Sivar!

Pretty soon you guys will need to do "Era" releases with all the units you are adding!

(That's my subtle nudge for an "Earth Defense Campaign" setup)
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The Era thing is among our discussed plans, but to be fair, it will require a lot more work to be envisionned seriously. First of all, we need to get the Black Lance and Border Worlds in shape to match the Confed and Kilrathi, which is not going to be a small effort to say the least. By that point, it will either be time to get older ships online, to rework a bit the Saga ones to have a common art style for all ships or to integrate Prophecy-era ships. No decision has been taken yet by the team, so don't quote me on that, but I am currently leaning towards the Prophecy era stuff as it could attract younger WC players who knew only that one and because Defiance already has some Prophecy capships. At that point, it might become important to have the Era system, if only to allow the kind of unit match-up we saw in the different games.

As for an Earth Defense Campaign, I guess it should be possible (I would have to see how the Hakaga model we have stands to the game's requirements), but setting up a campaign is some work I'm still inexperienced in right now.
 
Dundradal, well me and Defiance are planning on some kind of single player experience though the plans are largely dependent on whether we can get an map editor. I have plans on a border world campaign about 6 missions long in the style of a defence style campaign but nothing is concrete largely due to the fact I suck at writing dialogue. Though once we get all the stuff out the way on what to do once we are done with the essentials you can count on some kind of single player experience either in HW2 or if no such tool is ever available in the foreseeable future, in FS2.
 
Well, about that, I'm working right now to recreate the first mission of WC4 in the HWR engine. It's quite tricky to script, even though I'm getting most of the setpieces (Seether's attack on Orlando, the pirate fight). Nothing perfect right now, but it's advancing a bit.
 
Oh, I wasn't thinking of a single-player campaign, but that would be awesome to play. I just meant the ships from that period...Hakagas, Concordia, Confederation, etc...that players could battle with.

All those sound like cool ideas! I'm glad to see this mod taken up from dustbin and turned into something really great!
 
Dundradal said:
Oh, I wasn't thinking of a single-player campaign, but that would be awesome to play. I just meant the ships from that period...Hakagas, Concordia, Confederation, etc...that players could battle with.
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Well, we already have models for most of those, but they're not enough to make playable factions by themselves, so we're tinkering a bit. A single-player mode is more of a personal experience of mine to see what can be done.
All those sound like cool ideas! I'm glad to see this mod taken up from dustbin and turned into something really great!
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Amen. It was a dream of a decade for me, to be honest. Bonus point for hilarity in hindsight: the thread's first page.
 
Lunawolf242 said:
Dundradal, well me and Defiance are planning on some kind of single player experience though the plans are largely dependent on whether we can get an map editor. I have plans on a border world campaign about 6 missions long in the style of a defence style campaign but nothing is concrete largely due to the fact I suck at writing dialogue. Though once we get all the stuff out the way on what to do once we are done with the essentials you can count on some kind of single player experience either in HW2 or if no such tool is ever available in the foreseeable future, in FS2.
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Fortunately for us before my illustrious career in IT project management, I got my undergrad in English with an emphasis in creative writing. So I think we can work out the dialogue angle.
 
FLASH FLASH FLASH

Emergency transmission received from TCS Concordia. Last known location of the ship: Vespus System.

8B3AAEC9689F4832FA23CDBC9D3F62814A7F9D8A


No additional data was sent by the ship. Assume worst case scenario.

FLASH FLASH FLASH


Now what could it be, I wonder...
 
OK, people, a warning: this WE, I will probably send a massive update to the mod, with pretty much every single ship file being replaced, as I'm doing now the switch from the legacy format to the new optimized format, which will in a near future become the only supported ship format for mods, so the update will future-proof the files and avoid an annoying broken mod when GBX will do the dreaded update. Expect a good GB of files to redownload, sorry.

It might come later, as I'll have to check all files to see if they work properly.
 
DefianceIndustries said:
Good luck, Heart of the Modder...:D
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Heh, right now, it seems to work fine with the first ships I checked. The new files are a bit bigger, but it seems there is a slight improvement in the light effects, shadows, reflection, that stuff. Some ships were not converted by my script (Kilrathi fighters and a few others), so I'll have to check them precisely.

Edit: OK, I think I can fix them manually.
 
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Uploading the 3.2 version right now. You shouldn't really see any difference with the previous version despite the huge size of the update, but it should future-proof the mod correctly by replacing the .hod files of the ships, missiles and wrecks. Sorry for the inconvenience, people.
 
How do I check that I have the latest update? (Still figuring out the little things about STEAM...only took me two years to figure out I'd never accepted any friend requests! hahaha)
 
Dundradal said:
How do I check that I have the latest update? (Still figuring out the little things about STEAM...only took me two years to figure out I'd never accepted any friend requests! hahaha)
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If you can start the game while Steam is connected without it asking you to wait, you are up to date, as it automatically checks if the game and the additional files are the correct ones before starting. Right now, I have almost finished uploading the new files, so you should see within, like, half an hour, the download starting, it should be around 1GB. I'll check myself if the Steam version of the mod works as well as my private one too.

Edit: it's online, I'm doing the DL and check. Once it's confirmed to not go the CTD roite, I'll start the slow process of uploading it to ModDB. Expect several hours at least for that one,, since I need to upload the entire mod again and not just the modified files.
 
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OK, so it works, but with a few graphical issues, particularly for ships made of several meshes (the biggest ones) when they jump in/out. I'll work on that, but the main point is that the update is playable. I'm asking around if anyone knows how to solve that bug.
 
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Uploading a temporary "downgrade" to get the previous ship files for the biggest ships, that were causing graphical issues. Though this will only work as long as Gearbox doesn't update the engine to only accept the new .hod. After that, the new files will NEED to be used anyway. I just hope I'll be able to learn to use 3DSMax to fix them in time.
 
@L.I.F Mind me sending me a sample of the working ships you were working to work in the new engine. Think I cracked it but I need to double check to get some into the new HOD format.
 
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